Looks like the hosts will be chosen from the following four: Saudi Arabia, UAE, Iran, Thailand

The tournament will feature 24 team for the first time.

It appears that the qualification process will look like this:

FIFA World Cup/AFC Asian Cup preliminary qualification round:There will be 8 groups, with the 8 winners and the 4 best runners-up qualifying for the AFC Asian Cup finals (as well as the final qualification round of the FIFA World Cup)

Additional AFC Asian Cup qualification round:The next best 24 teams who were eliminated from the FIFA World Cup will get a second shot at qualifying for the AFC Asian Cup finals.

They will be divided into six groups of four, and they will compete for the remaining 11 or 12 places in the AFC Asian Cup finals.

I think that this a fairly logical set-up and an improvement on what they have now, with the overlapping AFC and FIFA WC qualifiers and additional qualifiers from the challenge cup.

Yeah that does seem to make sense. Cuts down the number of international dates a bit for the bigger nations too. Presumably this will lead to a lot of the really low ranked nations (Cambodia, Pakistan, Mongolia etc) potentially playing a lot more regularly against the bigger nations in the same way that the Faroe Islands and San Marino do in Europe? Up until now they were knocking each other out in the preliminary rounds before just a handful progressed to the group stages. Could be some interesting new destinations for Korea if they don't split qualifying on a geographic basis.

Holyjoe wrote:Yeah that does seem to make sense. Cuts down the number of international dates a bit for the bigger nations too. Presumably this will lead to a lot of the really low ranked nations (Cambodia, Pakistan, Mongolia etc) potentially playing a lot more regularly against the bigger nations in the same way that the Faroe Islands and San Marino do in Europe? Up until now they were knocking each other out in the preliminary rounds before just a handful progressed to the group stages. Could be some interesting new destinations for Korea if they don't split qualifying on a geographic basis.

It seems that way. The preliminary round looks like it will feature some David v Goliath type of clashes.

A few of the real minnows (e.g. Maldives) will probably also squeeze through to the additional AFC qualifying round where they will take on the likes of Thailand and Indonesia for the teams get a second bite at the cherry (remaining places at the AFC finals).

Also, with the AFC Asian Cup being increased to 24 teams, anyone who is semi-decent in Asia should qualify. Just had a look at the 2015 AFC Asian Cup qualification. There were five groups containing 4 teams. The best 3rd placed went through as well.

That means that in the qualifiers only 9 teams were eliminated. With the Challenge Cup places gone (Palestine, India having qualified through them) all the eliminated teams probably would have qualified for the finals if that format had been adopted for 2015.

The vast majority of those teams (who entered qualifiers but didn't make it) are from SE Asia (your Singapores and Malaysias) so we will probably see more of them at the finals in 2019. At the moment the finals are Australia + the big 4 from NE Asia with the rest all from central and west Asia.

So the Asian Cup is becoming a straight all in qualification the same way as Europe does things? Are they eliminating the qualification for holders, 3rd place and Challenge Cup winners? Are they eliminating the Challenge Cup entirely?

Also the hosts will have to participate in qualification for the Asian Cup if it also counts towards the World Cup or will the hosts also get a bye into World Cup qualifying?

How many teams total in the pot then in Round 1?

All in all Korea played 14 games to qualify for the WC and Asian Cup total. Is this going to be more or less in the new setup? Seems like it will need to be more and many of them will be against much weaker teams.

Can't help thinking that this isn't going to help Korea, Japan, Iran and Australia improve on their showing this year.

So the Asian Cup is becoming a straight all in qualification the same way as Europe does things? Are they eliminating the qualification for holders, 3rd place and Challenge Cup winners? Are they eliminating the Challenge Cup entirely?

Yes, no qualification for holders/runnerup/3rd placed teams.

The first phase (the "preliminary round") will be like UEFA. 12 will qualify for the Nations Cup (and final rounds of WC qualifiers)

On the face of it also no entry for Challenge Cup winners. Challenge Cup might still run. In fact it probably would be good for the teams that don't finish in the top 36 (the 12 that have qualified and the 24 that are given a second bite).

SteveW wrote:Also the hosts will have to participate in qualification for the Asian Cup if it also counts towards the World Cup or will the hosts also get a bye into World Cup qualifying?

They will participate in the initial matches as they double for the World Cup. Even if they are not one of the top-12 teams they will nevertheless qualify for the Asian Nations Cup. Instead the 24 teams given the second bite will compete for 11 and not 12 places.

SteveW wrote:How many teams total in the pot then in Round 1?

There are 46 AFC national teams - so the groups would have 5 or 6 teams (if they don't change their mind and have additional rounds).

SteveW wrote:All in all Korea played 14 games to qualify for the WC and Asian Cup total. Is this going to be more or less in the new setup? Seems like it will need to be more and many of them will be against much weaker teams.

It will be more. 8 or 10 matches in the preliminary round. Then it will depend on the format of the final round (which will be increased from 10 to 12).I assume two groups of 6 so 10 matches in the final round.

However, it will be interesting to see what will happen if the AFC are forced to absorb Oceania in order to keep 4.5 places (a 4.25 but still giving a fifth team a chance).

This contrasts with the 6 matches Korea played to get to the final round, plus the 8 matches in the final round.

Then again, if you factor the AFC qualification matches that will be removed -- the number will probably be very similar. (SKorea will probablyfinish in top-3 in 2015 but we are not certain of that).

The matches will also be spread over a slightly longer period of time than the 2014 WC qualifiers.

In addition, Korea is unlikely to play more than 2 crap teams, only one that will get a proper spanking. Pot 6 team (if Korea gets a six team group) will get annihilated. however, pot 5 team might not be that easy. The drastic drop in quality in Asia comes halfway through pot 5. In the 2014 qualifiers Mongolia would've been in pot 5 - but so would've the far more solid Vietnamese team.

SteveW wrote:Can't help thinking that this isn't going to help Korea, Japan, Iran and Australia improve on their showing this year.

Maybe I've got the wrong end of the stick though?

Hard to disagree with this observation. They will have to devote more of their time to play crap teams. Then again it doesn't hurt to see Germany play San Marino from time to time. As I mentioned above you are looking at no more than 4.

Also in the future it will be harder to arrange glamour friendlies with European and South American teams. Europe will have that nationsleague thing running parallel to EURO and WC qualifiers while South America is back to having a 3 year long qualification competition that will now feature an even number of team (with Brazil having to qualify).

Finally, while those 2 to 4 matches that the big boys will have to play are an inconvenience, the original set-up was really unfair on some middle ranking teams. The early rounds were played in a knock-out format and if you were unlucky to draw another middle ranking team thatwas curtains for you for another four years.

nzfooty wrote:Assuming I understand the process, and if there are no changes....

SteveW wrote:I'm a bit confused. (Hardly a new thing)

So the Asian Cup is becoming a straight all in qualification the same way as Europe does things? Are they eliminating the qualification for holders, 3rd place and Challenge Cup winners? Are they eliminating the Challenge Cup entirely?

Yes, no qualification for holders/runnerup/3rd placed teams.

The first phase (the "preliminary round") will be like UEFA. 12 will qualify for the Nations Cup (and final rounds of WC qualifiers)

On the face of it also no entry for Challenge Cup winners. Challenge Cup might still run. In fact it probably would be good for the teams that don't finish in the top 36 (the 12 that have qualified and the 24 that are given a second bite).

SteveW wrote:Also the hosts will have to participate in qualification for the Asian Cup if it also counts towards the World Cup or will the hosts also get a bye into World Cup qualifying?

They will participate in the initial matches as they double for the World Cup. Even if they are not one of the top-12 teams they will nevertheless qualify for the Asian Nations Cup. Instead the 24 teams given the second bite will compete for 11 and not 12 places.

SteveW wrote:How many teams total in the pot then in Round 1?

There are 46 AFC national teams - so the groups would have 5 or 6 teams (if they don't change their mind and have additional rounds).

SteveW wrote:All in all Korea played 14 games to qualify for the WC and Asian Cup total. Is this going to be more or less in the new setup? Seems like it will need to be more and many of them will be against much weaker teams.

It will be more. 8 or 10 matches in the preliminary round. Then it will depend on the format of the final round (which will be increased from 10 to 12).I assume two groups of 6 so 10 matches in the final round.

However, it will be interesting to see what will happen if the AFC are forced to absorb Oceania in order to keep 4.5 places (a 4.25 but still giving a fifth team a chance).

This contrasts with the 6 matches Korea played to get to the final round, plus the 8 matches in the final round.

Then again, if you factor the AFC qualification matches that will be removed -- the number will probably be very similar. (SKorea will probablyfinish in top-3 in 2015 but we are not certain of that).

The matches will also be spread over a slightly longer period of time than the 2014 WC qualifiers.

In addition, Korea is unlikely to play more than 2 crap teams, only one that will get a proper spanking. Pot 6 team (if Korea gets a six team group) will get annihilated. however, pot 5 team might not be that easy. The drastic drop in quality in Asia comes halfway through pot 5. In the 2014 qualifiers Mongolia would've been in pot 5 - but so would've the far more solid Vietnamese team.

SteveW wrote:Can't help thinking that this isn't going to help Korea, Japan, Iran and Australia improve on their showing this year.

Maybe I've got the wrong end of the stick though?

Hard to disagree with this observation. They will have to devote more of their time to play crap teams. Then again it doesn't hurt to see Germany play San Marino from time to time. As I mentioned above you are looking at no more than 4.

Also in the future it will be harder to arrange glamour friendlies with European and South American teams. Europe will have that nationsleague thing running parallel to EURO and WC qualifiers while South America is back to having a 3 year long qualification competition that will now feature an even number of team (with Brazil having to qualify).

Finally, while those 2 to 4 matches that the big boys will have to play are an inconvenience, the original set-up was really unfair on some middle ranking teams. The early rounds were played in a knock-out format and if you were unlucky to draw another middle ranking team thatwas curtains for you for another four years.

Cheers for that...helps me understand if not really agree with the proposal.

Not sure how you are working out your pots or how AFC do it to be honest but going by FIFA rankings as they stand the pots could be:

Which would mean Korea could end up in a group where Vietnam is actually the best team they might face

Imagine a group of Korea, Vietnam, Maldives, India, Sri Lanka, Bhutan. In theory that should be 10 games of handing out sore faces to weak opposition and will end up with the European guys not even bothering to participate.

While I'm sure the room saloners in the squad might enjoy Korea, Vietnam, Phillipines, Thailand, Laos and Cambodia I can't even begin to imagine what they would make of it if say Korea, Japan or Australia managed to pull Palestine, Afghanistan, Myanmar, Yemen and Timor Leste out the hat.

That ranking is based on the teams performances in the previous qualifiers.

That FIFA ranking is truly amazing. I just had a look. The scores of the Challenge Cup are multiplied by 2.5. 2.5 is assigned to FIFA World Cup™ qualifier or confederation-level qualifier - so they are treating it as an AFC Cup qualifier!!

Do those nerds in Zurich assigned to do this work actually look away from their monitors from time to time?

Then again, if they seeded Switzerland in the WC they might go with this ranking.

If you go with what I looked at you can still end up with a weak group like this:sing taj afg mac bhu

But that is quite unlikely.

What I should've written is this: On average, Korea is unlikely to play more than 2 crap teams

That said, I definitely painted the "best possible scenario" with my post above.

Asian soccer must adapt to the increasingly competitive nature of the world game or risk being left behind, Alex Soosay, the general secretary of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), said on Wednesday.Four Asian countries -- Japan, South Korea, Iran and Australia -- qualified for this year's World Cup finals in Brazil but none of them won a game and they all went out in the group stage.Soosay, speaking to delegates at the Leaders in Sport Summit at Stamford Bridge, said the AFC must make changes to both its international and club competitions to spark an improvement."In the AFC we realise that without better competitions among member associations we will struggle to adapt to the increasing competitive nature of the global game," he said."As such a new change is on the horizon for the AFC premier competitions. For the Asian Cup the number of teams will be increased from 16 to 24 for the 2019 edition.

A total of 40 teams (teams ranked 1–34 and six first round winners) will be divided into eight groups of five to play home-and-away round-robin matches, where the eight group winners and the four best group runners-up will advance to the third round of FIFA World Cup qualification as well as qualify for the AFC Asian Cup finals.

Having reread SteveW comments (and with the befit of time), I am completely in his camp on this one. The previous system was highly flawed but this is worse. I guess the dilemma is how do you help the smaller nations without hindering the progress the likes of Iran, South Korea, Japan and Australia should be making.